


Every Time we Count to Four

by Hecate



Category: Ghostbusters (2016)
Genre: F/F, Foursome, Foursomes are the Solution, Multi, Polyamory, awkward Erin is awkward
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-14
Updated: 2017-02-14
Packaged: 2018-09-22 14:00:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,294
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9610562
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hecate/pseuds/Hecate
Summary: She wakes up, and her memories are filled with flashes of skin and of lips on her own, and she thinks it had all been strangely easy just a few hours before.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [amyfortuna](https://archiveofourown.org/users/amyfortuna/gifts).



“I need a drink,” Erin says once the world has grown a bit quieter.

Patty throws an arm around her and pulls her in. Erin lets her, enjoys the peace of it. “I need a few,” Patty says. Holtzmann only laughs.

They stumble into the next best bar they can find, they buy drinks in strange colours, and whenever Erin stands up to get the next round, the world tilts and sways a little bit more.

The next day, she remembers the comments thrown her way about her hair, bad jokes and weird compliments. She remembers Abby next to her and Holtzmann across her, remembers Patty telling them about all the strange things that happened at the bar. She remembers that they left together, a pile of sluggish limbs and loud laughter. The sex, she doesn't remember. 

The others tell her it was pretty awesome.

She tries not to think about that.

They go out again, her hair freshly dyed, and Holtzmann gives one of the most awkward speeches Erin has ever heard. And she used to work at a university, she heard some really awkward speeches. She made an embarrassingly high number of them herself.

She drinks too many glasses of wine and when Abby kisses her, Erin holds on. And she thinks of not speaking to Abby for way too long, thinks of almost losing her, and Erin hates that part of her life. 

“I'm glad you're here,” she says.

“Me, too,” Abby answers. Holtzmann laughs at them.

For a few weeks, things calm down.

No ghosts, no speeches, no kisses, and no sex Erin doesn't remember the next day. She finally has time to get back into the science of it all, the things she and Abby theorized about for so long. And she likes the familiarity of it, loves the excitement of finally _knowing_ that at least part of it is real.

She and Abby waited so long for this.

“Sometimes, I still have trouble believing what has happened,” she tells the other three over Thai food. “There are ghosts. We fought them. And most of the city doesn't think we're complete lunatics.”

Abby grins. “I told you so.”

“Mostly, you screamed that in my face.”

Abby's grin grows bigger, and it's all so perfect; Abby and her, together again, Holtzmann and Patty fitting into the cracks and holes Erin made when she left all the ghost stories behind. It probably can't get any better than this.

Erin thinks she might be okay with that.

But things don't stay quiet and warm and easy. There are ghosts in their world, and Erin won't let another girl stare at the dead all night long. And their city... their city isn't ready to put up with the shadows and their claws either, so it calls for the Ghostbusters and the four of them answer the call.

It never stops being scary.

And Erin never wants it to stop.

Patty pulls them into a seedy bar next to a subway station after they’ve trapped the ghost of a serial killer, the history of his deeds spilling out of her mouth. Erin wonders if she and Abby ever look like that when they talk about ghosts. She wouldn't be surprised if it was the case.

Holtzmann gets them drinks in tiny glasses, her face bright with a smile, and Erin downs the liquid, curses seconds later. Holtzmann giggles. “Another?” she asks, and Erin shakes her head.

“God, no,” she says.

“God, yes,” Abby replies, and she's already crossing the room to get the second round. Erin sighs. And drinks.

She wakes up with an aching head and with Abby and Holtzmann surrounding her. Abby's arm around her waist, a dead weight that feels strangely comfortable, her body pressed against Erin's back. Holtzmann is curled into her, her hair a tickle against Erin's mouth. Patty's hand is on Holtzmann's shoulder. She wakes up, and her memories are filled with flashes of skin and of lips on her own, and she thinks it had all been strangely easy just a few hours before. 

She crawls out of the bed carefully, trying her best not to wake the other three. She needs a shower, she needs breakfast, she needs to get home and clear her head.

Her clothes are scattered all over the place along with the others', and Erin stumbles through the room, picks up a bra only to let it fall again because it's Abby's, finding Holtzmann's panties instead of her own.

It's like a jigsaw. Erin always hated those.

She finally leaves, closing the door behind her as silently as she can, as if she could wake a vengeful spirit with any sound. For a moment, she stands still in the hallway and imagines herself waking the others up with a knock, returning to bed with them. But she doesn't, and she tells herself it's the right decision as she walks out of the building. It's all just too complicated, too much, and they need to be focused on their work instead of on the way their bodies fit together.

At the office, she lets Kevin distract her with his pretty face and prettier smile, all veneer without much depth, nothing she could get lost in.

“You okay?” Abby asks when she walks in with the others, all of them hiding behind sunglasses. 

Erin nods. “Yeah, I wanted to get an early start on some research I've been throwing around in my head.”

“With a hangover?” Patty asks.

“She doesn't get hangovers,” Abby explains before Erin can say anything. “It's obnoxious.”

Patty collapses into a chair, pillowing her head on the table. “I'm jealous.”

Erin grins. “People usually are.”

“And I hate you.”

Erin shrugs, getting aspirin for all of them before returning to her work. The silence of science and people having headaches settles in the room. It's strangely comfortable.

When she leaves in the evening, Abby tries to stop her. “Drinks?” she asks, and Erin shakes her head.

“No. I think I need a quiet evening. Who knows when I'll get the chance for another one with the ghosts and all.”

Abby nods, smiles at her in the careful way Erin was so used to when they first started hanging out, the smile that was replaced by big grins and loud laughter later on. “Are we okay?”

“Yeah,” Erin replies, and she hates how her voice goes high and reedy. “We are.”

She hardly sleeps that night, and when she does, she dreams of three bodies in her bed, dreams of them dying, too. Wakes up with the need to touch and kiss, wakes up reaching out for something she can't save.

She goes to their headquarters early again. But she isn't the first. Holtzmann is already there, bent over a mess of metal and cable, something that sure will turn out to be insanely dangerous and very helpful.

“Hey,” Erin says.

Holtzmann greets her distractedly, not looking up. Erin lets her be. 

“We missed you last night,” Holtzmann says half an hour later, unbending herself and looking at Erin.

Erin smiles. “I needed a quiet evening.”

Holtzmann nods. “Yeah. Abby told us. Still, we missed you.”

Silence spreads out between them again, but this time it's awkward and wrong, and it doesn't belong there, not with them. 

“It's weird, right? It's totally weird,” Erin says, and she is sure that Holtzmann knows what she is referring to, knows that she doesn't need an explanation. Holtzmann gives her a look that is stuck somewhere between confused and disappointed. Erin should have talked with Patty about this. Patty is the normal one. 

“The only weird thing is that you ran away the morning after. We weren't all that drunk before we fucked and yet you still pretended as if alcohol made you do it,” Holtzmann says.

Erin swallows, looks away from her. “I'm not even into women,” she says, and it's a dumb thing to say because apparently she is into women, three to be specific. 

Holtzmann raises an eyebrow at her.

“Sorry,” Erin says, “I guess I am. It's all just...”

“Ghosts you can deal with, but not us?”

Erin shrugs, says, “I've always been bad with people,” and thinks, _I've always been good with losing them._ Tough that's not quite the truth. She only lost one person that mattered and that wasn't as much as losing as it was pushing her away.

“We all are bad with people. We're only good with ghosts. And each other. It's part of our charm.”

Erin smiles at that and wonders if she could find the right words to explain the complicated mess that resides in her mind and heart, the mess that has always held her back, that seems to slowly crumble these days. She wants to; she has wanted to ever since Abby came back into her life, ever since she met Holtzmann and Patty. 

They're worth it.

But she can't, she doesn't know how, and she is still searching for words when her phone rings, Holtzmann's following shortly after.

“It's Abby,” Erin says.

“Patty,” Holtzmann echoes.

“So, ghosts,” Erin translates, and they're grabbing the gear and getting the car. It's easy, this slide into action and away from everything Holtzmann said. It's familiarity and adrenaline and the knowledge that there is always somebody backing her up, and Erin is in love with it all.

She is in love.

When it's over and the ghost is captured, the other three wait for her just like they have done all the times before. 

“Drinks?” Patty asks.

Erin nods, smiles. “Drinks.”

There is hope in Patty's answering grin. 

The bar is the very same one they went to before they fell together for the first time. Erin has never been to a bar twice, hasn't even been to all that many bars, and she likes the repetition. She gets the first round, laughing at the whoops of joy that greet her when she returns to their table.

“You staying?” Holtzmann asks after the third time one of them peeled herself out of the booth to get more alcohol.

“Yes,” Erin answers, and giggles.

Holtzmann raises an eyebrow. “Are you staying?” she repeats.

Erin swallows. “Maybe? I guess? I...”

Holtzmann pats her shoulder. “Okay. Let’s find out later.”

It's an out, Holtzmann being easy on her, and Erin doesn't want to think about it, about the way it would have been welcome just days before and isn’t quite anymore now. 

She doesn't drink the cocktail Patty hands her.

Erin watches the others, listens to Abby's dumb jokes and Patty's long-winded stories and Holtzmann's laughter. It's home or maybe something even better, this moment and these women. Erin doesn't want to let go of any of it.

She thinks that she won't have to. 

Holtzmann takes her hand when they leave, an anchor to the decision Erin wants to make about them. “Okay?” Holtzmann asks.

Erin nods. “Okay.”

Abby's place is familiar again, the chaos that reigns in her part of the headquarters a mirror to her own place. It used to drive Erin crazy before she learned the patterns and the rules to it, before she started to find things when she was looking for them. Before she learned where she and her things fit in.

These days, she knows it again, even knows where Patty's jacket will end up and Holtzmann's shoes. And she lets her things drop in all the right places, putting Patty's bag on the couch because she always leaves it at the door and Holtzmann always stumbles over it.

There is a moment of awkward stillness after, the four of them standing in Abby's living room with nothing to say, nothing to do but take a few steps and reach out. And it's time. Erin turns to Abby because it's easy, because Abby had been her friend before everything, and Erin thinks she might have always been supposed to find her way back to her. 

If ghosts exists then maybe so does fate.

Abby smiles at her, all joy and excitement and hope, and this is easy too; leaning in to kiss her, pulling her in and turning the moment into a memory she won't forget. When they break apart, Abby smiles at her, and there is a challenge on her face, in her voice as she speaks. “You with us?”

Erin nods.

“She's always been with us,” Patty says, and her palm is hot against Erin's waist. “She’s just the awkward one who doesn't know what to do with her hands.”

Holtzmann snorts, and Erin turns to look at her, to look at Patty. Breathes in and takes another step. “Then show me.”

And Patty does.

The world narrows down to the four of them, to kisses and touches and Abby's big bed. It's Patty's hands guiding her and Holtzmann's voice in her ear; it's Abby's lips on her neck, on her breasts, on her belly.

It's an explosion of something new and something half-forgotten, and Erin falls into it all, reaches for it. And she promises herself that she'll be braver from now on about her fingertips dancing across Holtzmann's hips and her mouth on Patty's shoulder and all the things she wants from Abby. She promises herself not to be afraid of the world they can make.

When the sun is creeping through the curtains hours later, painting pictures on their bodies, Erin can't help watching as they keep on changing, rearranging whenever one of them moves. It's not quite art, this puzzle of them, but the pieces fit together perfectly.

She feels it when Abby wakes up.

“You're still here,” Abby says against her skin, the words a caress against her back.

“Yes,” Erin answers, “I am.”


End file.
